Activists Demand Justice After Border Agents Arrest Illegal… Then They Learn What She Did for a Living

An arrest by the U.S. Border Patrol has stirred up outrage in the activist community as a purported example of how President Donald Trump’s immigration enforcement policies are unjustly tearing immigrant families apart.

Viral videos posted to Facebook and YouTube on Thursday show Border Patrol agents — some in uniform and some in plain clothes — seizing Perla Morales-Luna as she was walking with her daughters in National City, California, last week.

She is then hustled into the back of a waiting Border Patrol SUV while bystanders plead with agents to release her.

Advertisement - story continues below

Activists and media organizations immediately seized on the videos as more evidence of heavy-handed immigration enforcement under the Trump administration, which has been accused of breaking up families by detaining illegal immigrant parents.

Immigrant rights groups say the episode shows how immigration agents have a free hand to arrest mothers and fathers who are not threats to public safety.

“It’s really a grotesque way of detaining and enforcing immigration law,” Benjamin Prado, coordinator for the American Friends Service Committee’s San Diego U.S.-Mexico Border Program, told the Los Angles Times.

“It is very quickly accelerating to a very tyrannical form of detention and arrest, snatching people up off the street.”

Advertisement - story continues below

Morales-Luna is not just an otherwise law-abiding illegal immigrant.

She is also a member of a Southern California-based human smuggling ring, according to Customs and Border Protection.

Do you think California should be punished for not implementing immigration laws?

YesNo

Continue with Facebook

-- or --

Completing this poll entitles you to The Western Journal news updates free of charge. You may opt out at anytime. You also agree to our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.

You're logged in to Facebook. Click here to log out.

“Perla Morales-Luna was identified as an organizer for a transnational criminal smuggling organization operating in East County, San Diego,” the agency’s San Diego field division said in a statement.

“She was arrested as a result of a targeted operation on March 3, 2018, in National City for being in the country illegally. She is currently in Border Patrol custody awaiting transfer to ICE for removal proceedings.”

Perla Morales-Luna was identified as an organizer for a transnational criminal smuggling organization operating in East County, San Diego. She was arrested as a result of a targeted operation on March 3, 2018, in National City for being in the country illegally.

Facebook has greatly reduced the distribution of our stories in our readers' newsfeeds and is instead promoting mainstream media sources. When you share to your friends, however, you greatly help distribute our content. Please take a moment and consider sharing this article with your friends and family. Thank you.